Programme News
8 April 2015
(News)
More than 40 years after being evicted from their land and 17 years of court battles, the Baphiring community – with the help of Lawyers for Human Rights (LHR) – is returning to their home in North West.
The Baphiring case sets a precedent of how communities should be settled on land restored to them through restitution.
The community, made up of more than 400 families, lived on the...
25 March 2015
(News)
The municipality agreed to establish a township next to Plastic View, but this would be only for those who qualified for low-cost housing.
In a case that is likely to grapple with the questions of how cash-strapped municipalities should allocate land for low-cost housing, a group of residents in Pretoria East has managed to temporarily halt the auctioning off of the land on which they live.
On...
25 March 2015
(News)
The scale - and cost - of the task of sorting out and settling restitution claims is staggering.
For those familiar with the mid-1990s land restitution programme, there was a strong sense of déjà vu about press reports on the reopened process: hopeful claimants queuing up to lodge claims, diligent officials working hard to assist them, optimistic managers talking up the systems that...
24 March 2015
(News)
Tuesday’s auction of the City of Tshwane’s land parcels may proceed as planned, but without Woodlane Village, the so-called Plastic View informal settlement.
Lawyers for Human Rights, on behalf of residents, successfully obtained an urgent High Court order against the Tshwane municipality on Monday afternoon.
Judge Legodi Phatudi found that auctioning off the property without a plan...
23 March 2015
(Press release)
The auction planned for the sale of Woodlane Village, also known as Plastic View, in Pretoria has been halted after Lawyers for Human Rights, on behalf of residents, successfully obtained an urgent high court order against the Tshwane municipality.
The land is part of nearly 80 properties meant to go on auction tomorrow (24 March). Over 3 000 people have been living on the land for more than 12...
23 March 2015
(News)
The High Court in Pretoria will rule later today if it should stop the Tshwane Municipality from selling off municipal land, including the notorious Plastic View informal settlement in the East of Pretoria, on a public auction.
Plastic View, also known as Woodlane Village, is amongst the over 70 municipal properties destined to be sold in auction on Tuesday morning. Today Lawyers for Human Rights...
13 March 2015
(Press release)
In a landmark victory for rural occupiers, the City of Tshwane has taken a decision to expropriate land being used for the Kanana Village in Pretoria.
The decision means that roughly 500 households living on the farm will not be evicted and will eventually obtain tenure security for the houses they have lived in for more than 10 years.
The Kanana Village was formed when evicted farm workers...
5 March 2015
(Press release)
The North Gauteng High Court has dismissed a rescission application brought by the Tshwane University of Technology against a contempt order obtained by Lawyers for Human Rights in 2014.
LHR is acting on behalf of evicted students.
LHR launched the contempt application after TUT failed to comply with an urgent order to allow students back into residences from which they had been unlawfully...
23 February 2015
(News)
One of the biggest properties that will go under the hammer next month is Plastic View informal settlement, bordered by red. The yellow line borders vacant land also set to be auctioned.
Pretoria - Woodlane Village – the so-called Plastic View informal settlement – in Moreleta Park is among the first batch of municipal land that will go under the hammer next month.
Another prime...
16 February 2015
(News)
She lost her ploughing fields to a mining company for R5250.
Now 96-year-old Raesetja Magongoa from GaMagongoa village in Mokopane, Limpopo, wants answers from Platreef Resources, the company which she claims seized her fields.
People from more than 15 Mokopane villages are expected to march to the Platreef offices today to submit a memorandum of demands.
This will be one of numerous attempts by...